Judith’s Comments (group member since Apr 15, 2015)

Judith’s comments from the Nothing But Reading Challenges group.

DQ Day 2
Chapters 9 - 15

6. We meet the 3rd member of the band, the wizard Moog. What are your impressions of the wizard? Were you as surprised as Clay that he agreed to go right away?
That his life (at least recently) has been fueled by grief and loneliness. No, I wasn't surprised especially after it was revealed he had the rot. It's his last chance at a big adventure and his best friends are looking for help. Of course he's going! :)

7. That was some entrance to the palace, don't you think? What were your first impressions of Matrick? Were you surprised by the turn of events in chapter 11? Excited or worried when Moog announces that he had a plan?
The palace adventure was. . . interesting and quite entertaining. And it goes to show you never really know what's going on behind closed doors. Moog strikes me as that friend whose ideas either save the day or cause everything to explode in a spectacular way. So if you hang with him, make sure your affairs are in order first.

8. After several descriptions sprinkled throughout the story thus far, we finally meet a druin. What do you think his plan is? Why does he really want the Council to stand down?
I agree that he wants his father's sword back. But as for standing down, I think he'd got some other plan in mind I just think we are missing some important information. Like maybe he needs those warriors for something else and doesn't want them 'wasted' on trying to break the siege?

9. Were you surprised at how Lillian arranged the funeral? What did you think of Clay's contribution? How successful would you rate Moog's plan?
This whole thing was kind of hilarious and I can only imagine their panic when they realized the plan to light the boat on fire. Well, the right people still think Matty is dead and they are all able to walk away so, 10/10?

10. Gabriel borrows Moog's crystal ball to check on his daughter. Were you surprised at what he saw? What did you think of the band's reaction?
I was a little surprised at what was shown but I knew it wouldn't be good. The band's reaction didn't surprise me, they know she's still alive so of course they are going to try and save her.

DQs Day 1
Ch 1 to CH 8

1.) What do you think of the premise of the book, like an aging rock band getting back together to go on tour but an adventuring band instead? Is the author pulling it off so far?
I think it's a great premise and one of the reasons I added to my tbr when Sammy recommended to me. I think he's pulling it off so far, I'm not going to dwell on it for analysis but as an inspiration to work from loosely, I think it's great!

2.) The rocks, may of hit me a bit in the feels. Did it affect your opinion of Gabe at all?
I felt it was a peak behind the curtain he doesn't often allow. Like others, I feel it helped make him a more real, relatable character instead of this goofy buffoon that gets his friends in trouble with his dumb ideas.

3.) How do you like the world building, is it being done effectively for you without major info dumping? Is it helping to set the stage for the story?
I think the world building is happening organically and not in a horrible info dump. I wish more authors would take the time to figure this out. There is still a lot to learn about the world and I have many questions which will hopefully be answered at some point.

4.) What did you think about the parade? Did anyone else enjoy Clay's reaction to the ladies being whistled at and be disappointed when the lady blew a kiss back instead of skewering the guy (like Clay expected to happen)?
When we were in Clay's head and he was like 'uh-oh' or whatever and was gob smacked and at her response, it made me like him even more. I'm with Cat on this one it was a bit disappointing the lady embraced it but I also think it means they are show pieces and not real adventurers who can swing a sword effectively.

5.) Do you have a favorite character so far?
Clay, he's hilarious. Love his family too. And I love he's totally cool with his wife making 5x what he does. For someone in his line of work, I don't think that's a common thing.


Bonus: Taking a poll for a very important question. On the Tassel Farm: Centaur or Moose?
I'm on Team Moose but I agree with Deanna that Centaur would be more interesting. I also agree with Clay though a moose could kill you just as easily as the centaur.
It's hard to appreciate just how big a moose is if you've never seen one in person.

DQs Day 1
Ch 1 to CH 8

1.) What do you think of the premise of the book, like an aging rock band getting back together to go on tour but an adventuring band instead? Is the author pulling it off so far?

2.) The rocks, may of hit me a bit in the feels. Did it affect your opinion of Gabe at all?

3.) How do you like the world building, is it being done effectively for you without major info dumping? Is it helping to set the stage for the story?

4.) What did you think about the parade? Did anyone else enjoy Clay's reaction to the ladies being whistled at and be disappointed when the lady blew a kiss back instead of skewering the guy (like Clay expected to happen)?

5.) Do you have a favorite character so far?


Bonus: Taking a poll for a very important question. On the Tassel Farm: Centaur or Moose?

Laura..devouring books like crumpets wrote: "first book done!!! was a 200 pager but i do love the six pack ranch boys!!!!

im trying to get a fair bit of reading in now as my family will be staying with me for a month from the 16th and it al..."

Yay! I saw in the spreadsheet 2 of you already have one book down. Which is a great way to start ;)

Note on the colors. I'd accept light for a bright.

So I'd accept this as bright pink:

Don't overthink the colors and if you aren't sure, post here in the thread.

Tricia wrote: "I'm so excited! I finished two of three books yesterday to be able to start some fresh today. What do we do now?

I'm guessing we have to tag the books we're reading with our TT shelf, right? Anyt..."

Yes, you tag/add the book to your TT shelf. Once you've read the book you can just add a read date to the spreadsheet.

If you really enjoyed the book (or even if you hated it and wanted to warn others!) you can post about it in the thread as a recommendation to the rest of the team.

I don't ask people to do completion posts because that can get a bit tedious and clog up the team thread. And if you've already put it in the tracking spreadsheet, there's no need to provide it twice.

That being said if
1) you aren't comfortable with spreadsheets
2) you have access issues (vacations, etc)
3) confused with how to enter things in the spreadsheet

people can certainly put the info in the thread and one of the captains can add it to the spreadsheet for them.

Bobbi wrote: "Quick clarification for our captains:

I know we may only use books started today on. I have a book that I only got 28/956 pages into. If I reread the 28 pages starting today and continuing from th..."

as long as you restart that's fine and if you haven't read any of it since Oct 2022 you're fine anyway since it's been longer than 6 months.

Happy Reading everyone! And former Lusties, don't do anything I wouldn't do ;)

My 2 bpm reader (which is what she read in Feb & March) ending up reading like 15 books in April. I think she had a school break or something because it came out of nowhere.

And we had someone completely ghost that got replaced with pixie books. It just a few but it certainly helped with the mini.

Especially with the April mini, it was novella city there for a bit

Yes, as long as it pops up with the title on GR, it’s fine to use

megan wrote: "Hello everyone!
I'm Megan in Indianapolis. This is my 5th or 6th Tower Teams challenge. (WOBBLE was my favorite (Battleship))

I'm a mechanical engineer in civil aerospace - jet engines. I have a ..."

Welcome Megan!

Maybe some former mods have some good nonfiction on their read shelves or you are able to make fun connections to past winning teams?

If nothing else nonfiction still has cover colors we can use in the rainbow towers!

But I do hear you about nonfiction being hard to make fit into tasks. I think it's a area we mods can do a bit better at having some more nonfiction friendly tasks worked in.

Jamie wrote: "Just as a heads up I am going to be unavailable starting sometime tomorrow, until either the 2nd or 3rd. I will be reading and once I have regular internet access and get get on the spreadsheet aga..."

Okay, thank you for letting us know. Hopefully you are doing something fun :)

Not pre-planning is totally fine! I tend to not plan far out either unless it's for really specific tasks.

Jamie wrote: "Hi everyone!
I am glad I randomly decided to look at the challenge chat. Hadn't realized teams were made lol. Now to catch up on some of the info we have here... :)

I did one of these challenges s..."

Welcome Jamie!

Laura..devouring books like crumpets wrote: "Im looking at The spreadsheet.... And their only seems to be info on the towere teams Mini challenge... Is that the Whole challenge or will Something else be announced nearer the time... sorry just..."

The 'main' challenge for TT this years is building the towers based on page numbers and just reading a bunch of books which was how the first TT started 10 years ago.

The plans for towers inspired by TTs in years gone by ballooned a bit so we thought we'd just let teams chip away at it throughout the challenge.

More things may be coming, us mods are tricky and like to keep teams on their toes.

It's all good and honestly at least some of your questions others probably had as well :)

Those are quite long responses, but hopefully that answers some of your questions. But please keep asking as they pop up :)

Answering Part 2 of your questions. Tracking spreadsheet in general.

You can do both. Entering books you know you are going to read and then others as you start or finish them. Both options are perfectly fine.

The 3 I entered first are all BOM (books of the month) for NBRC in May so I know I'll be reading them. Others I'll likely add as I go.

I'm fine if you want to wait to add them until you finish. Some people may wait until the have a few read and then add 4 or 5 completed books at once so they don't have to get into the spreadsheet as often. It's all fine with me.

There may be some things that pop up later in TT that have ore finite deadlines. If that's the case, we'd only ask that you have things logged by the deadline so we get the credit. If something like that happens, we'd post reminders in the thread.

As for books we don't need. . .well as long as it meets the requirement of TT, we can use the book. Even if it fits ZERO mini challenge tasks (unlikely, I can always make a book fit!! I am very creative! LOL) we can still get page points.

But if it doesn't meet the TT requirements, like a children's book with a word count that's too low (an example that's come up in the past is The Bad Beginning, the others in the series are long enough to count, but not the first book). You can of course read it and just not put it on your TT shelf. That's one of the reasons we ask people to make a TT shelf, so if you are reading other things they don't get mixed up with your TT books.

Hello Tricia!

I'm going to answer you in two parts. First the mini challenge. Yes, we are working on all of them and we have the whole challenge to chip away at them. It probably seems like an overwhelming amount of tasks. But . . . our teams monthly book count, based on sign ups, is 228 books per month. So that's closing in on 700 books by the end of the challenge.

As for which prompt to use. I try to start with what I think are harder tasks. Maybe it works for a harder to find letter like Z or U so I'd put the book there. Or it's a good color for the 18 book Rainbow tower, so I put it there.

And then list some other options in case a captain needs to move your book to a different task to get something to fit. Nothing is locked in for the mini challenge until the end of TT.

There's no wrong prompt to chose as long as the book fits there.

I would say after we complete the 18 book Rainbow tower, I'd put a lower priority on additional rainbow towers until the other parts are more complete.